As alumnus Kelly Towles sits outside a coffee shop down the street from his Washington office with his fiancé and business partner by his side, the co-owner of the upstart fashion label De*Nada Design compared his experience in the university’s fine arts program to life as a professional graphic artist.
“No one’s going to test you; you get to come up with whatever idea you want,” said the loquacious Towles, a 2002 graduate. “It’s not like college – no one’s going to give you an A-plus.”
Yet, in a way, Towles and fellow graduate and bride-to-be Virginia Arrisueño are receiving multiple A-pluses from the fashion community, as specialty boutiques and other clothing stores across the globe are distributing De*Nada’s T-shirts, hand bags, scarves and other accessories after noticing the couple’s unique designs at trade shows.
Arrisueño, who received a bachelor of fine arts degree from the university in 2002 with an emphasis on fibers, began working for a handbag designer after graduation. Shortly thereafter, she also started dating Towles, who she first befriended when he was her teaching assistant in professor Foon Sham’s wood-sculpting class.
In 2005, Arrisueño started De*Nada, incorporating her experience with fibers and handbags with Towles’ ability to design T-shirts, perfected from years working as a graphic artist for Whole Foods.
The couple said their displays at trade shows over the past several years enabled them to network and pick up about 40 distributors across the country, plus stores in Taiwan, Japan and Canada. Their items are also available for sale on their website, www.denadadesign.com.
The mission is clear-cut: “We’re about making limited-edition – not mass-produced,” Arrisueño said of her company’s multi-colored, simple-shaped products designed for young urbanites. “We want to make sure our product is unique.”
And the items are: Some of De*Nada’s products include neon-colored tote and hobo bags, a yellow T-shirt with black graffiti-like patterns and a soon-to-be-released scarf with conveniently placed zippered pockets.
“When you wrap it around your neck, you can use it as pockets,” Towles said of the scarf.
Arrisueño and Towles, being the only two De*Nada employees, have established a routine for their creative process that Towles likens to tag-team wrestling.
“We’ll take [a project] independently and then we’ll both talk about it,” Towles said.
While Arrisueño finds this collaboration mostly beneficial – “It’s great to have two pairs of eyes” – she said going to work with her fiancé every day can have its difficulties.
“It’s frustrating at times,” she said pensively, as Towles jokingly interrupted.
“I’m always right,” he deadpanned – proving Arrisueño’s point.
The playful ribbing continued when the topic of expanding De*Nada’s staff came up.
“I can’t wait until we can hire a sales rep,” Arrisueño mused optimistically.
“I can’t wait to fire someone,” countered the far more cynical – but still kidding – Towles.
But the tone took a serious turn when the couple discussed their wedding date. Arrisueño insisted the wedding would be imminent, before Towles gave an explanation for the delay.
“We’ve got a long engagement, because honestly, we’re knee-deep in this stuff,” he said. “[Running De*Nada] is like five jobs rolled into one. … Sometimes we forget we’re engaged.”
For the time being, the pair’s primary focus remains expanding De*Nada’s business, whether it be from selling their products at the huge Baltimore arts festival, Artscape, last weekend or from plans to display their line at a Las Vegas trade show next month.
“We’re really happy with how things progressed compared to last year,” Arrisueño said. “Now our studio is filled with orders. We’re hopeful things will continue this way.”
Towles added that focusing their lives almost entirely on De*Nada gives them a competitive edge over other fledgling fashion designers.
“We’ve done the circuits of craft fairs, and sometimes people can get stuck in that niche. You end up working a nine-to-five to support your craft habit,” Towles said, years removed from his Whole Foods gig.
It has also been nearly a decade since Arrisueño first caught Towles’ eye as a pupil in his wood-sculpting class, a day neither of them expected would lead to the birth of their careers.
“And you got A’s in my class, right?” Towles asked his partner in life and business.
“A-plus,” corrected Arrisueño.
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